Preserving United States Attorney Independence Act of 2007

Floor Speech

PRESERVING UNITED STATES ATTORNEY INDEPENDENCE ACT OF 2007 -- (Senate - March 20, 2007)

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Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I rise, first of all, to support Senator Feinstein's bill, which I proudly have been a cosponsor of, and I urge all my colleagues to do the same. I wish to thank Senator Feinstein for being the first to discover this provision and for asking the right questions, which then set us on this journey about the U.S. attorneys.

Second, I wish to thank Senator Leahy, our leader in the Judiciary Committee on this issue, who has been stalwart in making sure we get to the truth.

Some have been content to casually dismiss the administration's actions relating to the firing of the eight U.S. attorneys as a comedy of errors at the Justice Department. Make no mistake about it, this is no comedy, this is a tragedy. It is a tragedy for eight public servants whose reputations have been wrongly trashed. It is a tragedy for the reputation of the Justice Department, as a whole, and for the Attorney General, in particular. Most importantly, however, it is a tragedy for public confidence in our system of justice.

How can people have faith when the documents show that in this Justice Department allegiance to party is apparently valued over loyalty to the rule of law? How can citizens not be cynical when it is clear the PATRIOT Act was cynically manipulated to bypass checks and balances?

We all know politics plays a role in the Justice Department, but it should be second to rule of law. On too many issues in this Justice Department, politics came first and rule of law came second.

Weeks ago, we suspected the provision we are correcting today was no more than a mechanism to allow end runs around the Senate and the people. The e-mails have proven our worst fears. This provision was apparently added to the PATRIOT Act not for efficiency or national security but to make it easier to install political loyalists. This is how Kyle Sampson, the former Chief of Staff to the Attorney General, described how the slipped-in PATRIOT Act should be manipulated:

By using these provisions we can give far less deference to home State senators and thereby get (1) our preferred court person appointed, and (2) do it far faster and more efficiently at less political cost to the White House.

That is a memo to Harriet Miers.

That scheme was, of course, followed to install Karl Rove's former deputy in the Eastern District of Arkansas.

Here is another e-mail from Mr. Sampson:

My thoughts: 1. I think we should gum this to death: Ask the Senators to give Tim a chance, meet with them, give him some time in office to see how he performs. If they ultimately say ``no, never,''--and the longer we can forestall that the better--then we can tell them we will look for other candidates, ask them for recommendations, evaluate the recommendations, interview their candidates, and otherwise run out the clock. All of this should be done in ``good faith,'' of course.

That is an astonishing breach of trust. That shows that, at least according to Mr. Sampson, this provision could be used to keep political appointees in office for a long time.

So there is no doubt we must pass this legislation, which provides--and has always provided--for checks and balances on a runaway Justice Department. If there is proof

that it was ever needed, it is the actions of the Justice Department in the last several months. I am especially amazed, given the proof that this secret midnight provision was willfully abused at the highest levels of the Justice Department, how anybody could not vote for Senator Feinstein's legislation. This is the latest example of an executive branch run amuck, the most recent evidence of a Justice Department almost drunk with its own power and with little regard for checks and balances.

That is why our work will not be done when we pass this bill in a few hours. It is not enough to reform the law, we must repair the Justice Department.

Finally, last night we received 3,000 pages of documents. Some in the administration have started to spin this: See, they were fired for cause. But if you look at these documents, that is not the case. They read like an ``Alice in Wonderland'' tale. There are thousands of pages of stock documents, and we still have no real idea why many of these fine men and women were fired.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for 1 additional minute.

The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, the documents leave us scratching our heads in wonderment as to why they were fired. One e-mail shows that days before the purge, the Deputy Attorney General was uncertain about the reasons why Nevada U.S. attorney Daniel Bogden was fired: ``I'm still a little skittish about Bogden.''

The documents show that far from exhibiting performance problems, New Mexico U.S. attorney David Iglesias is highly praised by officials in Washington and even considered for promotion. Similarly, Washington U.S. attorney John McKay is also praised 3 months before he was fired. San Diego U.S. attorney Carol Lam was strongly defended by the Department on her pursuit of immigration cases months before she was fired. Finally, another U.S. attorney, Patrick Fitzgerald, widely considered to be one of the finest and most apolitical prosecutors in the country, was ranked in the middle tier and described as ``undistinguished.'' Meanwhile, two of the fired prosecutors were only a short time ago ranked in the top tier.

The more we dig, the deeper the hole it seems the Justice Department is in, with still no clear explanation as to why these fine prosecutors were fired. Make no mistake about it, we will get to the bottom of this.

This legislation is an early step, but we cannot rest until we have reformed the Department's ways and restored confidence, so that when people enter Justice Department buildings and see the eagle perched with arrows in her claws, it means justice and the rule of law, without fear or favor.

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